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Katsuhiro Harada, producer of the Tekken series and upcoming crossover spinoff Tekken X Street Fighter, says the idea of charging extra for downloadable bonus characters goes against his fighting-game philosophy – and that he has no plans for the Tekken series to follow Street Fighter's example.
“I see the characters and their move sets as chess pieces,” the producer explained to attendees at last week's Las Vegas-hosted Namco Bandai Global Gamer Day: “they are essential items necessary in the game and we would never sell any of those individually.”
Above: Three of the chess pieces from Harada's Tekken Tag Tournament 2, due for console release this September
The Tekken producer says that his series “has never had DLC before and charged for it,” stressing that he “was saying this before the Capcom thing happened – my stance hasn't changed.” He refers, of course, to the controversy surrounding Capcom's on-disc DLC, to be sold via upcoming Street Fighter X Tekken roster updates.
Harada's anxious not to be seen as criticizing this strategy – “it's Capcom's business decision, obviously” – but he says such a move wouldn't suit Tekken.
However, the producer hasn't ruled out other paid DLC for the series. “There are some strange people on Twitter who ask for really peculiar items,” he admits. If the team were to bow to fan requests and create in-game content not covered by the original budget, “obviously we’d have to charge a little bit for such items.”
